Searching for Rose

by Dana Becker

  I was always keeping an eye on you, April.

  And immediately her eyes, out of pure instinct, went searching for his again. Joseph’s eyes: her home. The only home she’d ever known.

  It was a powerful moment of reunion between April and Joseph. But it was just a moment. They were broken up. And there were good reasons for that. Reasons that still applied. And there were more urgent needs at the moment: April and Joseph knew that neither their love, nor their breakup, was a topic for discussion at the moment. There was too much work to do. Rose was out there, after all. She was alive, it seemed. But she was in grave danger. That was all that mattered right now.

  April looked away from Joseph. And Joseph, too, caught himself, and looked away. Carmen saw this, saw the entire exchange between April and Joseph, and she quickly jumped in.

  “Guys? Right now? We need to talk about Whitey,” she said. Joseph nodded. April just closed her eyes.

  “Tell her,” Carmen said to Joseph. “Go ahead. Tell her who Whitey is.”

  “Remember that story I told you?” Joseph said to April. “In your apartment? Remember you asked me to tell you a ghost story? And I did. Remember it?”

  How could she forget? Joseph had told her that it was a true story. The boy in that story was traumatized when his sister was accidentally buried alive. That boy never believed that she was dead. And he’d lingered by the graveside until he’d heard sounds coming from inside. He was the one who’d set off the alarm that night and gotten the family to start digging, to rescue his sister. She’d come out alive, but she was never the same. Nobody was, really. That little boy blamed his family for the monstrous accident.

  “That little boy was Whitey,” Joseph said. “He never forgave his family. My family.”

  And now that boy, all grown up, had become a dangerous gangster and cult leader, notorious for his brutal tactics.

  “Whitey is your . . . uncle?” April said. “You didn’t mention that.”

  “I don’t think of him that way,” said Joseph. “But yes, he is.”

  Whitey continued to pretend to stay within the Amish fold even though he was actually shunned by the community. But they lived in fear of him. And he used the Amish way of life as one of his covers for his criminal enterprises. He’d also, they said, created a small cult, in which he used the trappings of Amish life to lure unsuspecting followers. The cult he’d created wasn’t about business but about his sick need for adoration. Most people speculated that it was the result of his trauma from childhood. Whatever it was, his staying close to the community kept his enemies, and his siblings, on edge constantly. Meanwhile, from his compound in Amish country, his power grew and grew.

  And with Rose, who’d fallen into his net almost by chance, Whitey saw a chance to exact vengeance on the Young family, it seemed. And yet . . . what did he really want with Rose? Was it about money? Whitey always wanted money. But, oddly, it didn’t appear to be his motive in this case.

  “Well,” April said, “what are his demands then? What does he want?”

  Joseph and Ricky exchanged a look.

  “What is it?” April said. “Just tell me.”

  “We, um,” said Joseph. “We don’t . . . we don’t know.”

  “He didn’t say?” April asked.

  “We can’t get him to say,” Ricky said.

  “Tell me what this means,” April insisted, using all her strength to sit up, and look back and forth between Ricky and Joseph. “What are you guys not telling me?”

  “There’s nothing we’re not telling you,” Joseph said. “That’s the problem. He didn’t say anything about his demands. He isn’t making them. He’s not responding to us at all. And we don’t know what that means.”

  “Why can’t we go to the police with this?” April asked.

  Another look between Joseph and Ricky.

  “That’s what makes Whitey so dangerous,” Joseph replied. “He works with the police. Gives them information. And they stay out of his way.”

  “He works as an FBI informant,” Ricky clarified. “You know, a snitch for the feds.”

  “How do you know that?” April said.

  Joseph looked at Ricky.

  “We know,” Ricky said. “He talks to them all the time. One time, we set up a trap. We had someone tell him some made-up stories and then we heard—don’t ask me how, we have ways—we heard that the feds were talking about these BS stories. And they could only have gotten them from Whitey. That’s when we learned that he plays it both ways. But, really, we already knew it. That’s why we set up the trap in the first place.”

  Since the FBI considered Whitey a valuable asset, he operated under privileges. There was also reason to believe that some corrupt elements within the Bureau were themselves getting rich working with him, and so they had an added incentive to keep him out of legal trouble. Any time local or even state police would begin to close in on Whitey for something, the FBI would step in and find ways to get them to back off. Which meant that nobody dared cross Whitey because he worked under federal protection. And Whitey, without a leash, was a dangerous wild animal.

  “Is this why the cops have been so useless with Rose?” April asked.

  “That’s what I’d guess,” Ricky said. “Cops ain’t gonna do nothing here. If anything, they’re gonna try to shut us down. If Rose has a shot, we gotta do this ourselves.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Two women walked down the long hallway, arms folded. They said not a word. The only sound that was heard was the tapping and echoing of their heels against concrete. All of this was intentional. Whitey had many rules and regulations. Laws, he called them. And he was strict about them. In the Compound—which he’d designed himself, and which he’d spent nearly a decade constructing—he’d built unusually long halls, made of poured concrete. The idea was to create an intimidating environment. The women of Whitey’s group—all eleven of them, most of them runaways, some of them Amish runaways—were called the Community. The members of the Community were required to wear a certain shoe with metal heels that would make a maximum of sound as they walked around. And the women weren’t permitted to speak in the halls. As he told the women, “I want you to be alone. Alone with the sound of your footfalls.”

  The Community had many such laws. All members of the Community were to refer to Whitey as “Bishop,” as in “yes, Bishop” and “thank you, Bishop.” Every piece of clothing was mandated by the Bishop. The women had to keep a notebook in which they recorded their thoughts. Every morning, when they awoke, they were to record the dreams they’d had the night before and show these reports to Whitey.

  Whitey harshly upheld the Laws. But it was rare that he had to: he had other means of persuasion at his disposal. It wasn’t terror that kept the women obedient. Whitey manipulated their minds, their wills. Occasionally one of the women would wake up from this brainwashing and challenge him, but it was rare. Increasingly rare, in fact, since Whitey, over the years, had become more skilled.

  In the main chamber of the Compound, where Whitey held court, the women could speak only when spoken to. In their own rooms, which they shared, two to a room, they could speak openly. But they knew—or, at least those who’d been around long enough knew—that Whitey was always listening. And watching. And those who didn’t know that, usually those who were new to the Community, would soon find out. There were other things—secrets—that new members of the Community would soon learn. But not right away.

  The two newest members of the Community arrived on a Sabbath morning. It was mid-summer and the foliage was thick, covering the Compound heavily, blocking out much of the sun. This deep in the woods, the Compound was hardly visible in the trees. The two new members of the Community were walking down the long hall, arms crossed, as they’d been instructed by Grand Martha—Whitey’s deputy, a solemn woman whose hair fell all the way down her back, and who never smiled. These two women walked, their footsteps echoing loudly on the concrete floor, not saying a word.

&
nbsp; Today would be their first rite. They didn’t know what to expect. Grand Martha had been vague about it, just as she was vague about everything. But they had complete faith in Whitey. It was that faith, after all, that had brought them here to begin with. And it was a faith that Whitey had masterfully cultivated once they’d joined.

  As they walked the long hall, and heard their loud footsteps, they followed Whitey’s training: to mentally focus on the sound of those footsteps, to let all thoughts disappear. To not think at all. But to just listen. To follow the echo of the footsteps. To, as Whitey said, “keep following the echo, until the next echo, and the next . . .” for many minutes—for far longer than they expected—and to repeat, to no end, this mantra, under their breath: Kudsha brikh-hu, Kudsha brikh-hu, Kudsha brikh-hu . . .

  Which means, in Aramaic, The Holy One, Blessed is He. Repeated over and over again. Until the sound on their lips, the sound of their feet on the concrete, and all of the echoes within echoes, mingled into one swirling spell, putting their heads into a kind of trance.

  By the time they reached the main chamber, they were nearly hypnotized. And then they entered. They sat and swayed, with their heads spinning in ecstatic circles of Kudsha brikh-hu, Kudsha brikh-hu, Kudsha brikh-hu. And Whitey spoke to them in a loud whispering voice. It was a strange effect: he spoke to them as a group but, because it was a whisper, his words entered into every single woman’s ear as though it really were a secret just for her to know.

  The entire Community was there, that day, in the chamber. Eleven women, now thirteen, arranged in two small concentric circles. The inner circle was for higher-ranked members, the outer circle was for novices. They sat, cross-legged on mats. Sometimes Whitey would tell them to stand, or to adopt a pose and hold it while he spoke. Sometimes he would command them to lie on their backs, prone, with their eyes closed, as he spoke, telling them stories, giving them instructions, or rebuking them. Sometimes he would speak in Aramaic. Or he would lead them in hours of meditation until they were in an even deeper trance. He would hand out special concoctions for them to drink. An aid, he said, in their prophetic experience.

  Whitey himself usually sat on a mat placed at the center of the circle. Though often he would walk around the outside of the circle, sometimes letting a hand come to rest on a woman’s shoulder or back, sometimes whispering private messages into their ears as he walked by.

  On this day, when the two new novices of the Community entered the chamber—already somewhat hypnotized—they found the other women seated on their mats. In the center of the circle, seated above them, in a chair, was a young woman in a white dress, wearing a bonnet that was stitched with a veil that completely covered her face. Her hair flowed wildly out of the bonnet, almost down to her shoulders. Her hands were tied with bright red ribbons, to the sides of the chair. But she made no effort to loosen these bonds. In fact, she barely moved at all.

  “Yes, yes, enter,” said the man’s voice as the two novices opened the door and stood by it.

  “Please take your places,” the voice said.

  It was Whitey, of course.

  In a far corner of the room, he suddenly appeared; he’d been almost invisible standing against the wall in his all-white clothing. Now he slowly walked toward the circle of women sitting on their mats. His arm was extended, showing the new women the way to their own mats, which were waiting for them at the edge of the circle.

  “Welcome,” he said, “please make yourselves comfortable. This is your home.”

  When he said this, all the women—already trained in Whitey’s program—sighed loudly in unison, and said, together, “Our home.”

  Whitey smiled congenially at the new members, and said, “See?”

  One of the new members glanced, for just a moment, at the young woman who was seated in a chair in the middle of the circle, her hands bound, her face masked. She could see that the bound woman had reacted in some way to those words our home. But it wasn’t clear what that reaction was.

  When all were seated, Whitey led the women in chanting and breathing exercises. All the while, the tied-up woman sat in the chair, barely moving. Occasionally her head would dip down, or fall back for a moment, as though she were falling asleep.

  After a while, when Whitey felt his flock was sufficiently mesmerized, he said, “Lie on your backs, eyes closed.” Which they did. And while they did, he disappeared for a moment. And then another moment. He was a master of these pauses, of creating drama.

  Whitey reappeared, followed by another young woman, who was pushing a cart that held a big, steaming pot.

  “Open your eyes,” Whitey said, in a near whisper. “And sit up.”

  The women did as Whitey said.

  He walked over to the girl who was bound to the chair in the middle of the room. He took out a knife that had been holstered on his belt, and he raised it for all to see.

  El maleh rahamiiim! he shouted.

  Adonai hu ha Elohim! the women shouted back in unison.

  Whitey circled the knife over the girl’s head twice. He could feel the eyes of women in the room, glued to him, watching carefully what he would do next to this mysterious prisoner, whom none of them had ever seen before.

  Suddenly, and without warning, he shouted Adonai hu ha Elohim! and brought the knife down over the girl’s bonnet, over the veil that covered her face, ripping it from side to side, so that the lower half of her face, her mouth, was exposed. But her eyes remained concealed.

  One by one, the women walked over to the bound girl and bowed, then took a spoonful of the soup in the pot, and fed it to the girl; they gave her drinks of water from a jug, and whispered you are loved, and kissed her on the forehead.

  Rose hadn’t eaten in almost two days. And the soup, though plain, nourished her and gave her joy such as she couldn’t remember feeling in all her life. When all the women had finished feeding her, Whitey petted her forehead gently and brushed her hair lovingly with his fingers. And he whispered, “Your ordeal is over. You’re safe here. You’re home.” Rose, finally feeling a bit of energy, whispered, “Thank you” so quietly that Whitey couldn’t hear her.

  He leaned down toward her, and whispered, “What did you say, my darling?”

  He leaned in close to her mouth, so that he could hear her better.

  “I said,” Rose whispered, “I said . . . I love you.”

  * * *

  Though her body was slow in mending, April regained her mental clarity within a few days. Even though she still needed to rest, and she only left Carmen’s apartment infrequently and with great effort, she insisted on being included in every conversation and decision.

  Joseph, Ricky, and Carmen had turned Carmen’s apartment into a kind of headquarters where they carefully plotted their next moves. The alliance was, to say the least, uneasy. Ricky, more accustomed to criminal activity, had taken measures to sweep Carmen’s apartment of any bugs, to ensure that there weren’t any surveillance devices—and while he did that, April watched him carefully to make sure that he wasn’t installing any surveillance devices.

  She still didn’t trust him. “How do we know he’s not working for Whitey?” she whispered to Carmen when the men were away. The measures that Ricky was taking to avoid detection only unnerved her more. And Joseph and Carmen, too, were bothered by it: Ricky just seemed a bit too good at this kind of thing, a bit too professional, a bit too skilled at sneaking around, and it made all of them trust him less.

  Ricky had a connection close to Whitey. Which meant that Ricky knew a bit about Whitey’s movements and plans. This connection was willing to give them information, but that was all; he would offer them no other help.

  All of this only made Joseph and Carmen more suspicious of Ricky: he just seemed too close to Whitey. How could they be sure he wasn’t passing information about them to the gangster? Maybe he was playing all sides, too, just like Whitey. They were taking a gamble on Ricky. But what choice did they have? Ricky seemed to be their best bet. They needed
his know-how. Eventually, they knew that they’d need his men, too, and their muscle. And after all, it was one of Ricky’s guys who’d saved April’s life. Unless, of course, that too had been a ruse to gain their trust.

  At this point, Ricky’s connection to Whitey offered them updates every few days, about Whitey and sometimes even something about Rose. It was the clearest indication that they had gotten in months about Rose’s whereabouts, and her condition. It scared April to hear these updates, because they confirmed just how much danger Rose was in. She was truly in the hands of a sick and dangerous man, a person capable of anything. And yet these concrete pictures of her sister also gave her hope that she was alive. That she was even close by. It was better than the other option.

  Based on the updates they were getting about Whitey—his movements, and even his moods—the team of Ricky, Joseph, Carmen, and April were trying to get a picture of Whitey’s operations, especially its patterns: what were his daily routines and what were the potential weak spots in his operation? They were trying to determine where and when and how they might be able to strike at Whitey and either free Rose directly or else gain enough leverage against Whitey that they could negotiate her freedom.

  They kept lists and made charts of any information they gathered on Whitey. On the walls of Carmen’s apartment they posted a picture of Whitey, along with photos of everyone attached to him, and created a web of connections that they could see and consult in order to understand how best to get closer to Whitey, or better yet, slip through his defenses, and grab Rose. The goal was clear enough: they needed to infiltrate Whitey’s world and release Rose.

  At the end of every day, they studied their options and tried to gather more intelligence. They did this for weeks. They did it for a month. Every day they got a clearer picture of how Whitey worked. Who were his second- and third-in-command, what their weaknesses were. Based on all of the information, Carmen noticed that Whitey rarely left the Compound, but that his second-in-command left at least twice a week, sometimes more, to handle business in neighboring towns. They knew what car he drove. What diners he ate at.